DEAN's wife rips her in the Workrate Report one week, and Sable is gone by the next week. Now we know who truly has power in pro wrestling.And, is the over/under 6 months before Sable claims she was sexually harrassed again and files yet another lawsuit?

Still pondering why there was no public backlash for Jimmy Hart's advocation of self canibalism on the first Wrestling Album.

I guess both sides got what they wanted with this go-around. Some nice publicity in the Sable/Torrie Playboy issue, and she had some nice face-saving after that wonderful acting career went nowhere. I doubt she'll be doing Larry King Live this time, though.

In an interview with the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, Sable once again brought up that she feels WWE is sexist in how it treats women backstage.

"Even though she is back in the fold, Sable is still outspoken about sexism in the wrestling industry. She says the most gifted female wrestlers get passed over because they lack a certain California finish. They're not weight-training Barbie, in other words. 'Men aren't hired on looks,' she says. 'Some of the most talented women are not blonde-haired, blue-eyed women.' Of course, Sable's good looks haven't exactly been a non-issue in the course of her career. She is extremely proud of her status at Playboy and says the photo shoots were liberating for her. 'I love being sexy,' she says. 'But I also want to be thought of as an intelligent woman.' Sable says female wrestlers are held to a higher performing standard than men. And they're held to a different moral standard as well. 'The men in this business are able to have families because they have wives who stay home. The women have to choose. There are more difficulties as a woman. There are more sacrifices we make.' Sable says women who leave their families to go on tour are judged much more harshly than men."

"Why are you hiding? We are not monsters, we're just kids""There's a difference?"

In an interview with the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, Sable once again brought up that she feels WWE is sexist in how it treats women backstage.

"Even though she is back in the fold, Sable is still outspoken about sexism in the wrestling industry. She says the most gifted female wrestlers get passed over because they lack a certain California finish. They're not weight-training Barbie, in other words. 'Men aren't hired on looks,' she says. 'Some of the most talented women are not blonde-haired, blue-eyed women.' Of course, Sable's good looks haven't exactly been a non-issue in the course of her career. She is extremely proud of her status at Playboy and says the photo shoots were liberating for her. 'I love being sexy,' she says. 'But I also want to be thought of as an intelligent woman.' Sable says female wrestlers are held to a higher performing standard than men. And they're held to a different moral standard as well. 'The men in this business are able to have families because they have wives who stay home. The women have to choose. There are more difficulties as a woman. There are more sacrifices we make.' Sable says women who leave their families to go on tour are judged much more harshly than men."

She does have some good points there, even though her last point is applicable to most industries outside professional wrestling and is more of a societal problem than a problem confined to WWE. I do think, however, that the idea that males in WWE aren't discriminated against based on their looks is absolutely ludicrous. I mean, wasn't part of the motivation for creating the Eugene character was that they felt Nick Dinsmore didn't have a marketable look to him otherwise?

This isn't the popular opinion among wrestling fans, certainly not those of the misogynistic tilt who considered ECW's portrayal of women remotely palatable, but I've always liked Sable. Her exploitation of the Owen Hart tragedy was wrong and timed tastelessly, but everything else she said about WWE was true. It does exploit women, they do have it harder than men in wrestling, it isn't a safe working environment, and they are pushed/de-pushed based upon their looks more than anything else.

Sable came from a perspective of being the #2 star during the biggest financial boom in WWE history, and consequently her opinions and statement hold more water than a lot of people's. Behind Stone Cold alone, and later the Rock, Sable was the biggest attraction at that time. I really don't think it was only because she was a blonde bimbo, because at that time she was fighting men and sticking up for herself and I thought that was a very nice bright spot in an otherwise amoral muck of drunken heroes and blatantly racist and sex-obsessed gangs like dX and NOD. Now, as much as she blazed a trail for the objectification of women in wrestling, she didn't stoop to the level later reached by Stacy, Trish, Torrie and their ilk, though later she joined them at the bottom of that particular barrel when she came back last year. Still, I'd take body paint over barking like a dog, bra and panties over HLA, and "the grind" over Stacy bending over as his sole means of getting heat.

I still maintain that any man who was as popular as Sable was back then would have been treated like a Messiah, would have been portrayed as a legend and would never have been asked to do anything he was uncomfortable doing. It was her sex that allowed them to immediately become intolerant of her "attitude", which while arrogant is and was accepted in any number of lesser stars simply because they were men. I'd also say, that before Trish, Victoria, Molly and Jazz came along and raised the stakes of what a women's wrestling match could be in the common era of North American wrestling, Sable did quite well in the ring. For that time, it wasn't what women were doing in there and I think she tried hard to make a good showing of herself.

Since on this last run however, she did nothing but erase all of that previous good, I can't say I'm sad to see her go.

HMD, you make some interesting points. But I ask you...if Sable didn't look the way she did, do you think she'd have drawn a dime in 1998, regardless of how well business was doing? No. She made her name and her money because she had large breasts and she showed them off.

Don't forget, it's not how talented you are relative to other women, it's how talented you are relative to the product as a whole. Trish and Molly might be the tops when it comes to female wrestlers, but where would you rank them overall? They're not half as talented as guys like Tajiri, Conway, Nunzio, or any number of others who are stuck in the midcard without push or purpose.

T&A matches get reactions. Regular womens wrestling matches do not. There's a reason the womens title kept disappearing before they came up with the "grab a girl with big tits and teach her to wrestle" philosophy - no one wanted to watch unattractive women like Judy Martin and Leilani Kai chase an almost-as-homely Rockin' Robin for the womens title. WWF(E) fans don't care if Bull Nakano is highly thought of in Japan, they think she's ugly and thus they don't care. That's not my view on women in society, that's my perception of the wrestling audience. If you wanna say there's sexism involved, sure, there probably is. But it's a sexist paying public. WWE is going to give people what they'll pay for. The same as you don't see unattractive women at your local strip joint or posing in Playboy, you tend not to see it in WWE because there's no demand for it.

In the end, though, if any of the divas think like Sable, they should quit. If they were talented enough to sing or act, they'd probably already be doing it. Ditto if they had enough athletic ability to excel in a pure sport. Fact is, they're all making very good money and getting a ton of exposure, mostly due to the fact that they're appealing to the eye. I wouldn't begrudge a woman turning that down to pursue a more 'respecting' opportunity elsewhere. To hear complaints from Sable, a woman with three Playboy appearances under her belt and two well-paying stints in wrestling propping her up financially, I find it just a tad hypocritical for her to come out and complain about anyone or anything being sexist. She's more guilty of perpetuating those things than any other woman in WWE.

In the end, this woman made her name and her money on her looks. If she had a problem with that, she could have stopped 'exploiting' herself at any time and passed on the money that came with it. It doesn't take a lot of character to complain about something while you're getting paid well to do it. Hopefully the acting thing will work out for her this time.

So, Sable is gone. Should anybody really care? Has anybody really cared that she ever came back? The WWE has more attractive females now, more talented wrestlers and better speakers.

She was a nobody before Vince gave her some exposure. She used her sexuality to make millions. She used it to get a spread in Playboy. Then she leaves and files suit. Career goes nowhere, and then she comes back and since she isnt getting any real attention anyhow, agrees to pose in Playboy again. No heat, no matches, no real programs and then she leaves again. Big fat hairy deal.

Don't forget, it's not how talented you are relative to other women, it's how talented you are relative to the product as a whole. Trish and Molly might be the tops when it comes to female wrestlers, but where would you rank them overall? They're not half as talented as guys like Tajiri, Conway, Nunzio, or any number of others who are stuck in the midcard without push or purpose.

I agree with the bulk of your post, BigVitoMark, except the above portion. Yes, I think Tajiri is an extremely talented wrestler, but the other two guys? Conway and Nunzio? They're pretty mediocre. And Nunzio, I just don't get period. Honestly, I think the half of the women's division that actually CAN wrestle (Molly, Trish and Victoria, in particular) are more talented than them.